Hosea 10:1-8

Hosea 10:1-Ruth : . God’ s Annihilating Judgment on the Mixed Cultus.— With the land’ s abounding prosperity Israel has multiplied altars in the service of the mixed cultus; these Yahweh will destroy ( Hosea 10:1 f.) Their puppet-kings they shall find utterly impotent ( Hosea 10:3), and their idle, lying words, which never result in performance, shall yield a bitter crop of judgment ( Hosea 10:4, ? a gloss). Samaria ( i.e. the northern kingdom) shall find the “ calves of Beth-Aven” (Bethel, cf. Hosea 4:15, Hosea 5:8 *) a source of terror rather than of help, their glory departed, and the idols themselves ignominiously carried off to Assyria ( Hosea 10:5 f.). Samaria’ s king shall drift helplessly to doom, and the “ high places of Aven,” source of Israel’ s sin, shall be destroyed, and the deluded people left helpless and despairing ( Hosea 10:7 f .) .

Hosea 10:1 . Read perhaps, “ whose fruit is (or was) lovely.”— goodness: read “ prosperity” ( mg.) .

Hosea 10:2 . Marti thinks this a late gloss.— divided: i.e. in the cultus. Are they serving Yahweh or the Baal? Or render, “ their heart is false” (the cultus is no true worship of Yahweh at all).— be found guilty: LXX reads, “ be desolated” (Heb. yâ shô mmû) .— he: i.e. Yahweh.— shall smite: lit. break the neck of, perhaps with reference to the horned ox-head placed on the corners of altars.

Hosea 10:3 . No legitimate king reigns, only a usurper.— for . . . Lord:? a gloss (Marti).

Hosea 10:4 . The verse (? a gloss, Marti, Nowack) answers the question, “ What can he do for us?” Render, “ speak words, swear falsely, make covenants and (emended text) turn justice to gall” ( Jeremiah 8:14 *). The words “ in the furrows of the field” may be an insertion from Hosea 12:11.

Hosea 10:5 . calves: read “ calf.”

Hosea 10:5 b. Read, “ for him shall they mourn, his people and his priestlings, they shall wail for his glory that it is banished from him.”

Hosea 10:6 . Render, “ Yea himself ( i.e. the calf) they shall transport,” etc.— Jareb: cf. Hosea 5:13 *.— because . . . counsel: read, “ of his idol.” The source of Ephraim’ s shame is not so much false politics as the false cultus.

Hosea 10:7 . Render “ like a chip ( cf. mg.) upon the face of the waters.”

Hosea 10:8 . Read, “ the high places of Israel” (omitting “ of Aven the sin” as a pious gloss on “ high places” ).

Hosea 10:8 b. Cf. Luke 23:30, Revelation 6:16.